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Leaked Federal Climate Report Finds Link Between Climate Change, Human Activity (washingtonpost.com)
An anonymous reader shares a report from The New York Times (Warning: source may be paywalled; alternative source): The average temperature in the United States has risen rapidly and drastically since 1980, and recent decades have been the warmest of the past 1,500 years, according to a sweeping federal climate change report awaiting approval by the Trump administration. The draft report by scientists from 13 federal agencies, which has not yet been made public, concludes that Americans are feeling the effects of climate change right now. It directly contradicts claims by President Trump and members of his cabinet who say that the human contribution to climate change is uncertain, and that the ability to predict the effects is limited. "Evidence for a changing climate abounds, from the top of the atmosphere to the depths of the oceans," a draft of the report states. A copy of it was obtained by The New York Times. The authors note that thousands of studies, conducted by tens of thousands of scientists, have documented climate changes on land and in the air. "Many lines of evidence demonstrate that human activities, especially emissions of greenhouse (heat-trapping) gases, are primarily responsible for recent observed climate change," they wrote. The report was completed this year and is a special science section of the National Climate Assessment, which is congressionally mandated every four years. The National Academy of Sciences has signed off on the draft report, and the authors are awaiting permission from the Trump administration to release it. "The report concludes that even if humans immediately stopped emitting greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, the world would still feel at least an additional 0.50 degrees Fahrenheit (0.30 degrees Celsius) of warming over this century compared with today," reports The New York Times. "The projected actual rise, scientists say, will be as much as 2 degrees Celsius." Given the Trump administration's stance on climate change, some of the scientists who worked on the report are concerned that the report will be suppressed.
"The average temperature in the United States has risen rapidly and drastically since 1980, and recent decades have been the warmest of the past 1,500 years"
Ok, and there were glaciers down to what like Ohio less than 10,000 years ago. Pretty sure humans had nothing to do with the warming of the last 9900 years, where is the evidence that we affected the last 100 years of warming? (Hint: CO2 levels are flat if you don't cherry pick the historical data). What would the temperature rise be without humanity? Unless you can show me the science that explains the non AGW of the last 10,000 years, you don't really have a case for AGW at all. The globe gets warmer and cooler and has since it formed, life goes on.
Downmodding or calling me names does not validate AGW, just an FYI to all my friends in the pro AGW side of the fence.
If you disagree, please post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like
The globe gets warmer and cooler and has since it formed, life goes on.
So prove that the current warming is natural. You've made a statement that can be proven, but it never is. You can't just say the earth has been warmer therefore it's natural. That's like if my car breaks down with smoke pouring from under the hood I think it's just out of gas, because it's happened before. I could check gauges and see, but I'm relying not on current data but instead an historical anecdote. Really, the only evidence you have is that the earth was warmer at periods before. Yeah, no shit, no scientist has ever said it wasn't. What the research shows is that this warming is unprecedented in the earth's history. So your statement is nothing but an unproven guess with no evidence of support. What natural processes are at work here that do account for the warming?
Actually, while I'm not some rabid environmentalist (not that they are all like that), I think there's a lot to both sides of the equation, here - the earth has trends - it's been a lot warmer than it is now (without humankind), and it's been a lot colder. But I certainly do think we're at least acting as a catalyst, and that our presence is certainly having some effect, even if the overall temperature increases are not entirely human made.
But here's the rub - as the article points out, we can completely stop emitting greenhouse gasses (no we can't, but as the story goes) and we're still getting a 0.5c increase in temperature. What do people want? They are talking about 10% here, maybe 20% there... in other words, you're still talking like 1.75c increase in temperature. Instead of inflicting trillions of dollars in economic damage making the world stop producing, stop progressing, putting millions, if not billions out of work, we should be focusing on dealing with it rather than stopping it, because it's coming even if we cut emissions in half.
I'm not saying we shouldn't pursue "green" technology, I'm all for it. I'm certainly not for companies getting government grants of our tax dollars, then having the CEOs cut and run and the company goes bankrupt, but there's definitely the need for research, and the practical application of that research. I cannot afford to cover my roof with solar panels even though I wish I could. I can't afford it, and I wouldn't recoup my investment because I certainly won't own the house long enough. Maybe there should be more incentives there... .too bad we let the monopolies manipulate legislation that makes it harder for homeowners to do things like that instead of easier (In Sunshine State, Big Energy Blocks Solar Power).
Anyway, people need to get a grip on this subject and meet in the middle instead of allowing the politicians and media divide and conquer us. Anyone with a brain can admit humans have an impact on their environment; anyone with a brain can admit that we can't completely stop greenhouse emissions (unless you can "cure" farting, or the need to eat in general). So let's stop the hyperbole and have some reasonable discourse about how to deal with it instead of pointing fingers and name calling.
Stupid sexy Flanders.
The media machine is now pushing "leaked" as a synonym for "definitely true no need to ask questions"
I hate to break this to you, bro, but actual scientists are also a little bit ashamed when you call yourself a "scientist" with your associate's degree in CS from DeVry.
You could take everything "average people" know and understand about science and fit it in a Fox & Friends chyron. Don't believe me? When you're on the bus going to the call center tomorrow morning, ask them the difference between "average" and "mean" and see what the average answers are. If we're going to start using "average people's" knowing and understanding as any kind of metric in science, we might as well just give up as a species and elect a reality TV host as president.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Out of all the forces of nature we have first-hand experience of, not necessarily of all the forces we have seen evidence of, the greenhouse gas theory is the most likely.
This is the best argument that can be made for human-caused climate change.
We aren't talking about some simple system here. We can't just jump to conclusions. This is the ENTIRE WORLD weather system. It may be governed by forces we are not totally aware of or are totally ignorant of.
What exactly is the proof that global warming is due to human carbon emissions rather than a natural warming cycle with all the fermentation products in the soil and water from the beginning of the last ice age to present that are being released?
"Climate change" theorists do not seem to be able to answer this question, but it is the crux of the validity of their point of view.
Do they realize that the ice age literally just happened on a geological time-scale? That geological science just sprouted out of nowhere in the last 150 years and it's mostly been used to exploit coal, gas, oil, and minerals? There is only so much we have experience with, and only so much our theories can tell us. We simply do not know much about the planet's long-term weather/climate cycles, there is only so much the geological record has told us, it has only been looked into for so much.
Just everybody chill out.
There are much bigger and more immediate problems related to human presence that are objectively proven in cause and effect that are ravaging our not only our planet's natural state, but our own lives.
Honestly this "climate change" issue seems like a distraction from these issues, manipulating people into guilt over something that they have a very indirect influence on. Sorry but your efforts to 'go green' mean absolutely nothing in the face of industrial pollution, the most immediate and terrible effects of which would not be climate change even if that were proven to be the cause.
We need to worry about our society, the centralization of power: mass surveillance, automation, wealth disparity, human rights (especially freedom of speech and quality of education), the list goes on.
You cannot do ANYTHING about climate change until you deal with these problems. Stop kidding yourself.
You're not a scientist. You're a victim of the Salem Hypothesis.
If you have some special knowledge of climatology, then perhaps, just perhaps, you can pontificate, otherwise, you're just another fucking engineer (and a software engineer at that, so some might not even consider you an engineer in any meaningful sense) on a topic for which you have no fucking qualifications whatsoever. What you're trying to do is assert a fallacious appeal to authority, asserting because you had training in "computer science" that that makes you a scientist, and further that that allows you to lecture on the nature of a specific science.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Are you delirious? Without incredibly focused forward thinking action and significant sacrifice in quality of life, we are going to see horrible chaos and destruction.
With incredibly focused forward thinking action and significant sacrifice in quality of life, we are going to see much less horrible, but still pretty horrible chaos and destruction.
Coastal capitals underwater, hundreds of millions dead, bio-collapse of the acidifying oceans causing mass famine and marine animal extinction.
Seriously apocalyptic events will occur.
Absent proof of man's forcing of warming - we're left with only one conclusion: it's natural.
Nonsense. Lack of proof for X does not mean "not X" must be true. It just means that X is unproven.
Also, outside of mathematics, there is no such thing as "proof". Just evidence.
No one is making a criminal accusation; there is no innocence or guilt to be presumed.
However, a preponderance of evidence according to the scientific community, and the governments of nearly every country on Earth, is that humans are causing global warming and that it has the potential to do catastrophic harm to civilization.
If you were genuinely interested in the truth on this subject you would have found it out rather than raising spurious, discredited arguments on an internet forum for casual geeks, and thinking that the rhetorical turd you have dropped has an intimidating perfection because people would rather step around it than sweep it up.
You have chosen to be wrong on the internet, and more damning, chosen to be proud of it. You have a great future in politics or the 'chan. But the quality of your future IRL still depends largely on remaining above sea level.
Anyway, people need to get a grip on this subject and meet in the middle...
Silly attempts to look "fair & balanced" on the climate is a big part of the problem--as soon as you start doing that, you've caved to the anti-science crowd who think that, if they tell themselves enough fairy tales, they'll become true.
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
Continuing skepticism in the face of overwhelming evidence doesn't make you look clever or thoughtful. It makes you look like a partisan zealot refusing to admit when you're wrong. Here, you can read it right on their own Twitter feed:
https://twitter.com/KHayhoe/st...
https://twitter.com/KHayhoe/st...
https://twitter.com/bobkopp/st...
https://twitter.com/bobkopp/st...
The scientists who authored the report are confused as to why this is a story, and you're going to quibble over "publicly available" semantics? No, it was put up on public sites for "public comments". That's hardly equivalent to a "leak", and you damn well know it. I can't believe you're seriously making that argument. Or else, you're doing an awesome job of trolling me right now.
And seriously, "fake news" is an alt-right conspiracy? Are you kidding me? That was a narrative started by the left/mainstream media to explain how Hillary could have possibly lost the election. But the left gets hoist by their own petard whenever something like this happens, as reporters occasionally demonstrate a complete disregard for the most basic fact-checking before they breathlessly run a story that just happens to show the current administration in a bad light. We saw it happen with the Washington Post and the "Russians hacking the electrical grid" nonsense (they didn't even bother contacting Burlington Electric for a statement), and we see it now again with the non-existent fact-checking of the New York Times before publishing a completely made-up story.
Would I call that "fake news"? No, not really. Just plain bad journalism. But in the end, it really amounts to the same thing - misinformation presented as news.
Irony: Agile development has too much intertia to be abandoned now.
"The average temperature in the United States has risen rapidly and drastically since 1980, and recent decades have been the warmest of the past 1,500 years"
Ok, and there were glaciers down to what like Ohio less than 10,000 years ago. Pretty sure humans had nothing to do with the warming of the last 9900 years, where is the evidence that we affected the last 100 years of warming?
It's in the report. And in many other reports. You're simply saying that because there's natural warming, there can't be man-made warming. Are you also saying that because there's natural fires, there can't be man-made fires?
While in the medium term you could see more precipitation in the American Midwest, in the long term it will mean higher precipitation in winter and much less in summer, with much higher temperatures. In other words, one of North America's major bread baskets will become less conducive to agriculture.
The climate issue has a lot of actual problems, and here's the one that counter's your position.
Climate prediction is based on mathematical models which are trained on historical data and then carried forward to predict the future.
This process has never worked in any other human endeavour.
For example, the same process is used by many people in an attempt to predict the stock market. Does that ever work out?
The same process is used to predict the effect of changes in the economy, such as raising the interest rates. Has that ever gone horribly wrong(*)?
The same process is used to predict disease outbreaks, product viability, and the effect of importing cane toads in Australia.
There is no instance where a mathematical model with the complexity of Earth's climate has made reliable predictions in any way.
Furthermore, there are a multitude of models, scientists discount out the ones that don't seem right, and hand-tune some of the parameters to make the outcomes more reasonable.
So saying that "such-and-so" will happen is simply the output of an elaborate random generator, tuned and selected for the outcome that fits the narrative.
This is one of the real problems with the climate science debate: no model of that complexity has ever been accurate, therefore it's incorrect to be making decisions based on their results.
(*) It was used as a justification for the bank bailouts, offshoring, free trade, and easy immigration. All of these were predicted to make our economy stronger.
> What I don't understand overall is that warming isn't necessarily bad. Higher temps and higher CO2 levels?
That means sea levels rising ever higher as well. For example over a hundred million people in Bangladesh, one of the world's poorest countries, live in a river delta that is barely knee height over the level of Indian Ocean. They will either drown or have to mass migrate to survive. Where exactly do you migrate them, considering that Asia is already the most populated continent?
Consider that they are the world's poorest people, most of them lack electricity and survive on the equivalent of a dollar or two per day, so they are NOT the people who caused AGW by either consuming or producing excessive amounts of commercial goods and energy for hedonism. They are victims the world has forgotten. Similarly, many atoll islands in the Polynesia-Micronesia region will sink like Titanic, as the Pacific ocean levels rise. Florida will also face huge problems, so kiss US pensioners goodbye!
Instead of inflicting trillions of dollars in economic damage making the world stop producing, stop progressing, putting millions, if not billions out of work, we should be focusing on dealing with it rather than stopping it,
You're using a straw man here. Most people aren't advocating anything like that.
If anything, combating climate change means more work (creating and building new technology), not less. And yes, that's worthwhile. One extra degree of warming (if we don't do anything vs. if we do try to stop climate change) may not sound so much, but it translates to a lot of sea level rise, putting hundreds of millions of people at risk. It means weather extremes get more extreme.
Stopping the increase in emissions has other advantages. Cleaner air means fewer people die. Reducing reliance on fossil fuels means less power to those who produce the fossil fuels.
And we're going to have to transition to other fuels anyway as coal, gas and oil run out, so why not now?
meet in the middle
There is no middle. One one side you have science, on the other you have people denying the science while not backing up their assertions with facts.
I'd say we can't really handle getting warmer any better than we can handle getting colder.
In a certain fundamental sense, it is much easier to handle getting colder. Heat is easily generated by various processes, but it cannot be destroyed. It can be moved around, but that won't help if it's hot everywhere.
Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
Humans aren't the only, or most important things, on the planet. We're fucking up ecosystems that have taken millions of years to stabilize and balance, and cannot react fast enough to survive the rapid changes we are causing.
What I don't understand overall is that warming isn't necessarily bad. Higher temps and higher CO2 levels? Better food production.
If you would have said warming isn't necessarily *all* bad, you'd be a lot more accurate. There will be some benefits, for sure. But overall the bad is expected to outweigh the good. It's easier to measure the impact in terms of costs, rather than "cans" and "can'ts". Because yes, of course we *can* survive it all and do all sorts of technological wonders combating the negative effects, but what is it going to cost? We're going to having rebuild/retrofit/move our coastal areas which encompass many major cities. We're going to have to shift our agricultural production regions, not just crops but livestock too. "Hot spots" might become quite inhospitable where susceptible people may not leave the house for more than a few hours (infants/elderly) or impede outdoor day jobs for everyone else. Then the oceans, oh the oceans. Don't know where to start on that one, let's just leave it at wild seafood may become a delicacy.
I'm going to throw a dart and say we're talking about not 10's but 100's of trillions of pure USD. Not counting the impact in human costs. That's the problem.
What I don't understand overall is that warming isn't necessarily bad. Higher temps and higher CO2 levels? Better food production.
Better food production in limited areas. However, the land will be devastated in many regions that are currently relied upon. More volatile weather will result in extreme drought followed by extreme rainfalls. Some plants will do well but many will not.
So what is the real effect of this? Mass extinctions of wildlife both on land and the ocean. Untold millions will perish from die from famine while others will migrated. It won't always be migrating for refuge either, wars will be fought over land for food production.
But hey, if you like mass extinctions, mass migration, war, genocide and famine, the future is looking rosy.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
vs.
Funny, how these guys never argue with each other...
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
How a generally pro-science forum like slashdot can have a good chunk of its posters revert to fox news talking points on politically charged issues.
The same, tired, debunked, denier arguments again and again..